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ABM Done Right: Going Beyond Flipping Funnels

Over the past year, many B2B marketers are pursuing Account-Based Marketing (ABM) programs to drive more demand. These marketers realize that traditional lead-based marketing has not been tightly aligned with the goals of their sales teams. They find that Sales needs help penetrating and closing deals across a defined universe of target accounts. While much of the conversation in the industry to-date has been about explaining ABM and its value, we at Kwanzoo believe it’s time to move the conversation beyond ABM to “ABM Done Right”.

Why Does “ABM Done Right” Matter?

We believe that it is not enough to simply pursue ABM as the newest marketing approach that’s en vogue or “cool” today. The only way an ABM program will experience sustained use and continued growth at B2B companies is if it delivers results–and delivers them early.

We believe it’s important to get the right ABM building blocks in place, understand the full range of investment needed, define a model for expected outcomes, and implement best practices from Day One to be able to iteratively improve and to achieve long-term success.

Are You Asking the Right Questions?

As ABM continues to develop and grow from a concept into a strategy, we see the same questions popping up over and over again. These range from operational – “How should we kick off our ABM program?” – to attribution-related – “How do we measure ABM success?”. There is a lot of confusion about the types of providers needed to launch a successful ABM program.

With so many ABM solutions emerging in the market one of the most common questions we see is “Where does one ABM provider’s capabilities stop and the next one’s begin?”. If you’re planning to launch an ABM program, save yourself from reinventing the wheel and head over to ABM Done Right: Are You Asking the Right Questions? for some guidance.

From Frameworks to Products that Deliver Real Value

Over the past year, a few different ABM providers have attempted to define exactly what ABM is or should be by introducing their own frameworks. These frameworks try to define an execution process for ABM, from account list selection to customer journey mapping, and from which assets should be presented/delivered to the success metrics to be used in program evaluation.

While these frameworks can be helpful, the ABM tech provider offering the framework themselves deliver at most 10% of the complete ABM process described in their own framework. We’d urge customers to not get caught up in the fancy words and framework visuals – look beyond for providers who have the tangible products that will help you get from where you are now to where you need to go. Want to learn more? Check out ABM Done Right: From Frameworks to Products that Deliver Real Value.
Does Your Provider Align with Your Best Interests?

While it may seem like common sense, we find that many companies ignore alignment around key values when it comes to selecting tech and services partners. If your goal is to build lasting partnerships and to achieve mutual success–wouldn’t it make sense to see that you’re on the same page as your provider before you get started? For this reason, we highly recommend that you evaluate a provider’s core values as a key part of your provider selection process. At Kwanzoo we pride ourselves on always keeping our customers best interest in mind. Three key points of value that we strive to provide with our ABM offerings are:

Tired of all the confusion around ABM? You’re not alone. We’ve heard from many of you that it is hard to figure out what’s going on in the market, where different solution providers fit, and where ABM is headed next. That’s why we kicked off our new ABM Done Right webinar series this April.

Are you an ABM CEO or Marketing Leader and Interested in speaking on an upcoming ABM Done Right webinar? Contact us.

What’s Next?

You will be hearing from us on some of these topics in the coming weeks.

Anatomy of a Good ABM Discovery Call

As you meet ABM tech providers, are you providing the right level of background and insights on your business to them? Are you following “best practices” in engaging with potential providers to make the process efficient for both sides? What questions should the ABM tech provider ideally ask you both prior to and during your discovery call and demo meeting?

Setting up an ABM Pilot – Designing it Right and Measuring Success

What should be the scope of an ABM pilot? What are key considerations for measuring success? For prospecting? Customer upsell / cross-sell? Sales pipeline and revenue impact?

Don’t miss out! Join us for the 1st ABM Done Right CEO Panel on April 14th with panelists from 6Sense, Bizible, Triblio and ZenIQ. Register Now!